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Next to Windows Solitaire, I am pretty sure the telephone is responsible for more time wasted at work than any other invention. How else can you explain the number of times we finish a conference call and make that, “well that was a total waste of my time” look?

In all fairness, meetings in general, if not executed well, have a history of wasting time. I am sure that when Ogg called his cavemen friends together to discuss how to best kill a wild beast, that there were some in the cave playing hangman on their stone tablets wondering when this meeting would end.

If you are in your forties or later you probably remember that little 3 minute cartoon from Schoolhouse Rock on Saturday mornings. Three indeed is a magic number.

Did you know that the triangle is the only shape that cannot be deformed without changing the length of one of its sides? This is why the triangle is the basic element of structures called trusses used in bridge design as well as construction of house roofs. If you need strength, three is your number.

The human brain tends to remember things more effectively in groups of three as well. Writers learned this long ago and developed a word for it – the tricolon.

“Vini Vidi, Vici” – Julius Caesar

“Government of the people, by the people, for the people.” – Abraham Lincoln

Even famous quotes like Churchill’s “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat.” are pared down and remembered as blood, sweat and tears.